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Make your own Painting KIT for Beginners

February 23, 2019

Anyone who ever entered the painting world wondered what should their painting kit for beginners contain. This is a good question and it’s very common. You can say a lot about it and this is a subject that requires a lot of attention.

It’s only logical that a painting kit for beginners or a starter artist pack would contain support materials such as paper, canvas, wood or glass, but also colors (oil, acrylic, watercolor, ink, pastels or gouache), and tools like brushes, cloths, easel, solvent or palette knives.

However, when you look at the variety of products in an art supply store or an online store, you get easily overwhelmed. A lot of new questions start to pop in your head:

Which one should you pick?

Which products have the best quality-price balance?

How important is the quality of the mediums and tools from your painting kit for beginners?

Does it matter if you buy the cheapest products for your painting set for beginners?

On the following, I will try to help you understand these points and make your own painting kit for beginners. Let’s see what colors, support materials and tools you should have in your painting set for beginners.

What should I paint on?

Canvas – Photo source: pexels.com

One of the most important elements from your beginner artist set is the support. Whether you paint with oil, watercolors or acrylic, the paper should have a certain paperweight. You should remember at all times, that a thick paper is better than normal paper. When you add water to a thin paper, it will create waves and ruin the final result. Also, if you use pastels, try to find a textured paper.

If you want to paint on canvas, for beginners is good to choose primed canvas. The primed canvas contain gesso and you can start painting directly on them. In art supply stores you will also notice yellow or beige canvases. These particular type of canvas is useful for painting portraits. The colors look realistic and they blur a bit the pigments.

What paint colors should I pick?

Every beginner artist encountered this dilemma. They wonder if they should use acrylic or oil paint. I’d say you should try both and see for yourself, but not right from the beginning. It’s best if you start painting with acrylic paint. It’s water based and you can work easily with it. Plus, the price is low. However, when you will begin painting with oil you will see a big difference in pigment and shine.

The acrylic is fast drying and you can paint with both opaque and transparent techniques. Oil paint is opaque and very pigmentated. However, it takes a while until it dries, so you can make late changes. Remember, that a cheap color contains a smaller quantity of pigment in its composition.

You might be tempted to buy a set of colors, but I recommend you to avoid this solution. The price is expensive and you can’t choose the colors you get in your set. I recommend you to have the following colors in your painting kit for beginner artists:

titanium or zinc white

ultramarine blue

cyan primary blue

Prussian blue

vermillion red

magenta primary red

primary bright yellow

lemon yellow

yellow ochre

burnt umber

burned sienna

sap green

bright green

mars black

I also like to get bright turquoise, bright orange and violet because when I mix the complementary colors I don’t get the desired color.

What painting brush is the best?

The variety of brushes is incredibly big. You can get synthetic or natural fiber brushes. The tip of a brush is also relevant for the medium you use. If you want to focus on watercolors a round brush is better. It will retain more water and color.

However, for acrylic and oil paint, you will see that a flat brush is very useful. But, you will notice in time that a pig hair brush is better for oil, while synthetic brushes are better for acrylics and watercolors. Another tool I like to use for oil paintings is the palette knife. It might feel a bit difficult at the beginning, but in time it will feel incredibly amazing to work with it.

What are the auxiliary tools for painting?

Brushes – Photo source: pexels.com

Another tool you will need for the artist starter kit is the palette. I used both wood and plastic, but also ceramic. They are all great, but mostly I use ceramic for watercolors, wood for oil and plastic for acrylics. However, this choice is up to you and how you get used with it.

Another element is the easel, however, it’s not so important. But from my experience, I recommend you to get one. Painting on a desk is fine, but in time, you will start to get frequent back pain. It’s healthier to paint while standing.

If you paint with oil, you should also get odorless thinner. Oil will not dissolve in water, so you will need something to thin the paint and clean the brushes.

What painting brands should I use?

I don’t really have some brand to recommend you to use. I’ve been using Maimeri for oil and acrylic and Pheonix for watercolors. There are many brands online you can pick from Maimeri, Winsor & Newton or Polycolor.

For watercolors, you should pick a paper with more than 200 gr/mp weight. When it comes to acrylic, chose cotton canvas, while for oil you should pick linen canvas.

Conclusion

Having all this information in mind, you can pick your materials and tools to create your own painting kit for beginners. Have a beautiful day!